Advanced Web Ranking’s latest CTR report flips last quarter’s story. In Q1, desktop click-through rates at the top organic positions were improving while mobile dipped. In Q2, desktop slid and mobile climbed, according to AWR’s international data for April through June 2026.
What the Q2 numbers show
Across all searches, desktop CTR at positions one and two fell a combined 5.27 percentage points, while mobile CTR at the same positions rose 6.59 points. For single-word queries, desktop position one lost 4.15 points and mobile position one gained 7.42 points.
Branded queries were particularly lopsided: every top-20 desktop branded CTR fell between 1.47 and 3.08 points, while mobile position one added 1.40 points. Informational, commercial and location queries followed the same direction: desktop down, mobile up.
Industry results mostly lined up. Arts & Entertainment gained 2.40 points at desktop position one, and Law, Government & Politics posted the largest single-position increase with mobile position one up 17.31 points. The biggest single-position drop was 13.31 points at desktop position one in Style & Fashion.
AI Overviews still compress clicks
The report also separates U.S. results pages with an AI Overview. On desktop, positions one and two combined for 29.05% CTR without an AI Overview and 10.04% with one, a 19.01-point gap. On mobile, position one showed 35.95% without and 8.51% with an AI Overview.
Monthly figures reveal even more variation: U.S. desktop position one had a 1.96% CTR on AI Overview pages in April, then 10.23% by June.
The measurement break to remember
These comparisons cross the end of a Search Console logging error. Google says impressions were misreported from May 13, 2025 to April 27, 2026, which affects CTR and average position, though clicks stayed accurate. AWR’s free CTR tool uses Search Console data, so Q1 figures sit mostly inside the error window and most of Q2 falls after the fix.
That means some of the desktop/mobile split may be a data correction as much as a change in user behavior.
- Split comparisons at April 27. Treat impressions and CTR before and after that date as separate datasets.
- Use clicks as a stable anchor. Google confirms clicks were not affected by the logging issue.
- Segment by device and query type. Averages hide branded, informational, commercial and location differences.
- Separate SERPs with and without AI Overviews. CTR behaves very differently when an AI answer is present.
What to do with the trend
Don’t read a quarterly CTR swing as a durable shift. AWR says its Q3 report will show whether the device split is “a permanent trend or a temporary seasonal spike.” Q3 runs July to September and sits entirely after Google’s correction, so it will be cleaner.
For now, monitor position one and top-five CTR by device, isolate AI Overview SERPs, and keep April 27 in every lookback window you build.
Source: Search Engine Journal
